Arxiv – Reexamining classical and quantum models for the D-Wave One processor (18 pages) USC Researchers revisit the evidence for quantum annealing in the D-Wave One device (DW1) based on the study of random Ising instances. Using the probability distributions of finding the ground states of such instances, previous work found agreement with both simulated …
Spacex has raised an addition funding of about $200 million. The investment values Spacex at about $10 billion. Launches currently cost under $60 million for a low-Earth orbit launch on SpaceX’s Falcon 9 craft. Spacex has made progress to reusable rockets. Reusable rockets cost bring the cost of launches to between $5 million and $7 …
My schedule is messing up where I can only go to the 014 Rejuvenation Biotech conference at the Santa Clara Hyatt Regency on Thursday Aug 21 and Friday Aug 22. I will be able to go Saturday. It is all day both days. To go on behalf of Nextbigfuture. You will ideally liveblog the event. …
An unconditional basic income (also called basic income, basic income guarantee, universal basic income, universal demogrant, or citizen’s income) is a proposed system of social security in which all citizens or residents of a country regularly receive an unconditional sum of money, either from a government or some other public institution, in addition to any …
Superconductors.ORG herein reports high Tc has been advanced to 77 Celsius (170F, 350K) with the discovery of the compound Tl7Sn2Ba2MnCu10O20+. This exceedingly high transition temperature (Tc) was achieved by substituting manganese into the titanium atomic sites of the 65 Celsius superconductor announced in January 2014. This substitution increases the dielectric constant (K) of the anion …
Adapted from methodology used by the U.S. Federal Reserve’s “Beige Book,” The China Beige Book™ is an 80 page quarterly report that uses both quantitative and qualitative data to track real-time conditions within the Chinese economy, both regionally as well as within each of eight key industries within each region. In addition to providing clients …
A recent demonstration involving two trucks tethered by computer control shows how automation and vehicle-to-vehicle communication are creeping onto the roads. A pair of trucks convoying 10 meters apart on Interstate 80 just outside Reno, Nevada, might seem like an unusual sight—not to mention unsafe. But the two trucks doing this a couple of weeks …
Sergey Brin unveiled Google’s first car built from scratch, a gondola on wheels with no steering wheel and no brake pedals. Brin also discussed his impatience with the pace of innovation and his disappointment with the NSA surveillance revelations and joked about new projects (or not) around invisibility cloaks, fembots and thousands of hovering satellites. …
The process of designing, developing, building and deploying satellites is long and expensive. Satellites today cannot follow the terrestrial paradigm of “assemble, repair, upgrade, reuse,” and must be designed to operate without any upgrades or repairs for their entire lifespan—a methodology that drives size, complexity and ultimately cost. These challenges apply especially to the increasing …
The 1.5 gigapixel AWARE 10 camera, Triton, was completed in October 2013. A 4 gigapixel AWARE-10 is being completed and refined now. There is continuing research and work towards 10 gigapixel and 50 gigapixel cameras. Duke is working with DARPA on gigapixel cameras and eventually petapixel cameras. What is the fundamental limit of pixel count? …
The New York Genome Center (NYGC) and IBM today announced an initiative to accelerate a new era of genomic medicine with the use of IBM’s Watson cognitive system. IBM and NYGC will test a unique Watson prototype designed specifically for genomic research as a tool to help oncologists deliver more personalized care to cancer patients. …